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Principals

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Essay
How Educators Are Faring in the COVID Era
Teachers and principals are twice as likely as other workers to experience frequent job-related stress. They report higher rates of depression and burnout, and much lower rates of resilience. What can school districts do to better support them?
Aug 25, 2022
Report
Educators' Views on Politicized Topics in School
A survey in January 2022 asked educators about policies for COVID-19 safety in schools and classroom conversations about race, racism, or bias. Almost half of principals and 40 percent of teachers reported that the intrusion of political issues and opinions added stress to their jobs.
Aug 10, 2022

Explore Principals

Journal Article
Survey: Principals Say They Need Better-Trained Teachers and More Resources to Address Student Misbehavior
Educators have long struggled to reduce student misbehavior—a challenge that has become more acute since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. We highlight two things principals say they need to reduce misbehavior: better teacher prep and resources.
Jun 20, 2023
Journal Article
Survey: What Purpose Do Suspensions Serve? Principals Don't Seem Quite Sure
Efforts to encourage principals to limit use of excessively punitive disciplinary practices have been underway for more than a decade and yet suspension rates remain high. We sought to learn more about principals' beliefs about school discipline.
Jun 20, 2023
Brochure
The American Educator Panels Pricing Sheet: Taking the Pulse of America's Educators
This pricing guide describes the American Educator Panels and provides costs for the various research options available.
Jun 16, 2023
Blog
Ukraine's Recovery, Mental Health First Aid, School Staffing: RAND Weekly Recap
This weekly recap focuses on the trade-offs of Ukraine's reconstruction, the effects of a Mental Health First Aid training program, school staffing challenges, and more.
May 5, 2023
Report
Principals' Views on School Staffing Shortages
During the surge of the COVID-19 omicron variant in spring 2022, most principals struggled to keep classrooms staffed. They said a lack of substitute teachers was the main reason for the shortages. And many reported that hiring had become more difficult since the previous school year.
May 3, 2023
News Release
Teacher Supports, Guidance for Elementary Social Studies Education Vary Widely Across United States
The basic infrastructure to support elementary (grades K–5) social studies instruction—academic standards, accountability requirements, assessment programs—is inadequate in many states. Even where state-level infrastructure to guide teachers' instruction is in place, its comprehensiveness and quality vary greatly.
Mar 7, 2023
Report
Support for Elementary Social Studies Education Varies Widely Across States
Over the past few decades, U.S. schools have increasingly sidelined students' civic development as one of their priorities. The infrastructure to support grades K–5 social studies instruction—academic standards, accountability requirements, assessment programs—is often missing or inadequate.
Mar 7, 2023
Report
Educator Turnover and How Districts Are Addressing It
Teacher turnover rose to 10 percent nationally at the end of the 2021–2022 school year. Principal turnover also increased, reaching 16 percent going into the 2022–2023 school year. How are states and districts responding to these staff shortages?
Feb 16, 2023
Report
American Instructional Resources Surveys: 2022 Technical Documentation and Survey Results
This technical report provides information about the sample, survey instruments, and resultant data for the American Instructional Resources Surveys that were administered to principals and teachers in spring 2022 via RAND's American Educator Panels.
Nov 15, 2022
Report
Learn Together Surveys: 2022 Technical Documentation and Survey Results
This report provides information about the sample, survey instrument, and resultant data for the 2022 Learn Together Surveys that were administered to K-12 principals and teachers in March 2022 via the RAND Corporation's American Educator Panels.
Nov 3, 2022
Report
Strategies to Diversify the K–12 Teacher Workforce
All students—especially those of color—benefit academically and socially from having teachers who are people of color. Ways to recruit and retain more diverse teachers include lowering the cost of becoming a teacher, increasing the diversity of the applicant pool, and building positive collegial relationships and inclusive school environments.
Sep 19, 2022
Periodical
RAND Review: September-October 2022
The cover story is a profile of RAND's new president and CEO. Other features explore how teachers and principals have been faring in the COVID era and how to improve media literacy among middle schoolers.
Sep 8, 2022
Blog
Homelessness in L.A., Russia's Military Woes, Educator Morale: RAND Weekly Recap
This weekly recap focuses on breaking the cycle of incarceration and homelessness, Russia’s ongoing military struggles, NATO expansion, and more.
Aug 19, 2022
Commentary
Will Teachers Quit? What Surveys Can and Can't Tell Us
There is no single source for reliable current data about teacher and principal turnover or job openings, so it's understandable that journalists rely on survey data to monitor the health of the teacher and principal workforce. But media coverage that focuses only on the connection, or lack thereof, between teachers' intentions to leave and actual turnover stands the risk of minimizing the clearly stated dissatisfaction that educators are expressing.
Aug 11, 2022
Commentary
Educators' Poor Morale Matters, Even If They Don't Quit. Here's Why
State and district education leaders can take steps now to reduce teacher and principal stress this fall in two ways: Recognize that job-related stress is systemic and that educators closer to the classroom may experience more of it, and talk with teachers and principals about the sources of stress in their job, and what could alleviate them.
Aug 11, 2022
Report
Creating Conditions for Teachers' Use of High-Quality Instructional Materials: A Research, Policy, and Practice Conversation
In this webinar, RAND researchers and state department of education officials in Delaware and Mississippi discuss the work that states and districts are doing to encourage and support the use of high-quality materials.
Aug 4, 2022
Report
Collaborating on University Principal Preparation Program Redesign: A Summary of Findings for University Principal Preparation Program Providers (Volume 3, Part 3)
University-based principal preparation programs (PPPs) prepare the majority of U.S. school principals. This targeted report shares findings from a study of an initiative to support improvements to PPPs, with an emphasis on findings for other PPPs.
Jun 20, 2022
Report
District Partnerships with University Principal Preparation Programs: A Summary of Findings for School District Leaders (Volume 3, Part 4)
This report shares findings from the RAND Corporation's five-year study of The Wallace Foundation's University Principal Preparation Initiative, with an emphasis on findings for school district leaders.
Jun 20, 2022

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Research conducted by

RAND Education and Labor

Researcher Spotlight

Christopher Joseph Doss

Policy Researcher

Christopher Doss (he/him/his) is a quantitative researcher at the RAND Corporation who specializes in fielding causal and descriptive studies in education. His research interests are broad and have focused on early childhood education policies, educational technologies, STEM education,…
Elizabeth D. Steiner

Policy Researcher

Elizabeth D. Steiner (she/her) is a policy researcher at the RAND Corporation with expertise in education policy, policy analysis, program evaluation, and qualitative methods and analysis. She is also a member of the Pardee RAND Graduate School faculty. Steiner's research is focused on ways to…

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